SAN JOSE — A man was being sought by police after he allegedly carjacked someone and hit another victim in the head with a hammer days after he was released from Santa Clara County jail under emergency court measures to reduce jail overcrowding during the coronavirus pandemic.
James Mitchell Correa, 25, is being sought in a reported carjacking and hammer attack in San Jose on April 15, 2020, according to police. Five days earlier, he was released from jail in an unrelated car theft case over the objections of prosecutors who said a prior carjacking conviction and his gang affiliations made him a public-safety threat. (San Jose Police Dept.)
James Mitchell Correa, 25, is wanted by San Jose police in a pair of attacks Wednesday in San Jose in which he is accused of commandeering someone’s car by saying that he had a gun, and the separate hammer attack. Officers spotted him Friday in South San Jose in the stolen car and wearing the same clothes from the carjacking, but he eluded capture after a brief car chase, police said.
Last week, Correa was charged with stealing a car, resisting arrest, and violating his parole — for a prior carjacking conviction — after he was arrested April 6 in San Jose. He reportedly refused to be escorted to court for arraignment for three days, and on April 10, his required appearance was waived and he was formally arraigned via phone conference, according to attorneys and court records. He was released later that day.
Because the latest charges against Correa were either nonviolent felonies or misdemeanors, Judge Arthur Bocanegra ordered his release, in part citing emergency measures that set bail for such offenses to $0 during the COVID-19 state of emergency declared by the governor. The measures, instituted by the California chief justice and Judicial Council, were aimed at maintaining baseline court operations and slowing the influx of inmates at jails to allow for safe distancing and quarantine areas.
Santa Clara County Deputy District Attorney Kevin Cogbill objected to Correa’s release, describing him as a gang member who was on parole for a violent crime, and who posed a public-safety threat.
Records and court accounts show that upon his release, Correa was scheduled to be transported by ambulance to the Field Respite Center, the temporary hospital facility set up at the Santa Clara Convention Center. Correa had claimed while in custody that he was infected with COVID-19, but that was not fully corroborated with prosecutors by the time he was let go.
What happened to him next is unclear. Correa, who in records is listed as transient, resurfaced Wednesday after the reported carjacking and hammer assault, police said.
San Jose Police Chief Eddie Garcia said he was frustrated given that the same judge ordered the release earlier in the month of two men, charged with dozens of drug trafficking and gun offenses and who were alleged to have links to Mexican drug cartels, under the emergency court measures.
“This is a travesty of justice for my community,” Garcia said. “I hope this judge goes to bed praying that this criminal doesn’t kill or hurt anyone else or cause my officers harm. Because that would be a difficult burden to carry.”
District Attorney Jeff Rosen said Correa needed to be an exception to widespread jail de-population efforts — Santa Clara County jails had a Friday census of 2,354, a 26% decrease from early March — achieved largely by the release of nonviolent and low-level pretrial detainees and people with expiring jail sentences.
“We can and should protect both public health and public safety during this pandemic,” Rosen said Friday. “We carefully reduced our jail population to have space for dangerous and violent criminals like this defendant.”
When reached for comment, a spokesman for the Santa Clara County Superior Court cited prohibitions against judges commenting on pending cases.
After the previous instance with the drug and weapons defendants, supporters of the emergency measures described cases like these as outliers that should not be used to distort the fact that the vast majority of people being released are not violent and are being spared from unnecessary infection risks in jail.
Garcia said he would not have necessarily opposed the jail release of a car-theft suspect, but that Correa’s violent history should have given the court more pause.
“If you let a misdemeanor offender without this history out, I wouldn’t hold you accountable since you can’t predict that person would do something like this,” he said. “But (Correa) had all the signs of someone who was going to hurt someone.”
The chief reiterated his previous stance that no matter what the court outcome, his officers will continue to arrest people who present a public danger.
“If any criminal thinks they get a pass from this police department, they are woefully mistaken,” he said, “because we’ll continue to take them off the street.”
